Prince Harry to pay legal costs to Mail on Sunday

Prince Harry will have to pay more than £48,000 in legal costs to the publishers of the Mail on Sunday, after losing part of a libel battle.

It follows a failed attempt by his lawyers to strike out part of a defence against a libel claim he is bringing against the newspaper.

The libel claim itself can still go ahead to a trial, to be heard between mid-May and the end of July next year.

The dispute relates to an article about Prince Harry's security arrangements.

The Mail on Sunday article had discussed changes to the prince's publicly funded security that had happened after he had stopped being a working royal and had moved to the United States.

In this long-running libel case, the prince has claimed the story falsely suggested he had "lied" and "cynically" tried to manipulate public opinion.

The headline said the duke had "tried to keep his legal fight with the government over police bodyguards a secret", but that his "PR machine tried to put a positive spin on the dispute" after the story broke.

The prince's lawyers had sought to throw out Associated Newspapers' defence, arguing it had "no real prospect of success" - but in a ruling last week, the judge rejected this, saying that the case should go forward to a trial.

Mr Justice Nicklin said the newspaper group's argument that this was "honest opinion" had a "real prospect" of successfully defending the case.

He also said there was a real prospect of the newspaper proving its side of a dispute over the timing of when Prince Harry first offered to make a private payment towards the cost of his police protection.

The libel claims will now be decided in a trial, expected to last three to four days.

The costs in this part of the case, £48,447 to be paid this month, will be only a small fraction of the overall legal costs.